THE Northern League leader, Senator Umberto Bossi, yesterday claimed that more than four million people had voted in his party run "referendum" for a federal, independent and sovereign Republic of Padania".
The Northern League leader called the initiative a success, arguring that it endorsed his party's call for the secession of "Padania", basically all of northern Italy From Piedmont across to Fruili and as far south as Tuscany and Umbria.
More than 13,000 ad hoc polling booths were set up in gardenstyle tents throughout "Padania yesterday, with 12 million citizens aged 16 and over were entitled to vote" in a "referendum" which, while it has no legal status, nonetheless represents another trial of strength between the unorthodox Mr Bossi and Italy's political establishment.
Speaking to reporters From the garden of his home near Lake Maggiore, Mr Bossi said that the success of the initiative meant that when his party again took its place at the current allparty constitutional reform commission, it would have a clear mandate to discuss the secession of Padania.
While Mr Bossi chanted victory, his opponents questioned both the seriousness and the success of the referendum.
Journalists reported having been able themselves to vote more than once in the referendum.
The Alleanza Nazionale spokesman, Mr Maurizio Gaspari, said that the voting figures due to be released today by the Northern League were certain to be false.
The Italian Prime Minister, Mr Romano Prodi, dismissed the referendum as "not serious", suggesting that the Northern League should understand that politics "is not just a big game".
The President, Mr Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, reiterated that Italy was "one and indivisible'
Other spokesmen for both the centre left government and centre right opposition urged Mr Bossi to drop his demand for secession and return to parliament to make his contribution to discussion of federalist reforms.